"CUCKOO'S NEST" STILL TOPS

         
The movie so good, it's crazy.

         
Jack Nicholson stars as Randle Patrick McMurphy in Milos Forman's triumphant version of Ken Kesey's novel.

         
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is the story of a convict transferred from hard labor to a mental institution. At first this seems like a better deal, but McMurphy soon learns that the head nurse (Fletcher) doesn't appreciate his boisterous ways, and likes a rigged game.

         
Necessarily the film differs substantially from the book. Kesey's novel is a first-person present tense account from a Native American WWII vet who has been on the ward the longest. This perspective facilitates Kesey's surreal descriptions, but the filmmakers show the story from a more conventional, detached point of view.

         
Conceivably, another film version could showcase a stylized presentation including voice-over narration from Chief Bromden. But that didn't happen in 1975.

         
Produced by Michael Douglas, Cuckoo's Nest launched several careers. Danny DeVito and Christopher Lloyd went straight from the ward to the hit TV show "Taxi." It was also Will Sampson's first film.

         
The 6'5" Creek Nation painter and rodeo performer stands out as the guy everyone thinks is a deaf mute.

         
Two things in particular hold Cuckoo's Nest together: the characters and the setting. The characters are as believable as they are unforgettable (Kesey drew on experiences as a mental hospital orderly), and the setting is the perfect microcosm for everyone's condition.

         
Like a sun god in a resurrection myth, RPM (always going, always moving) can't help but show his fellow loonies how to have some fun and start living. He's a guy with an easy grin and calloused hands who can't believe the nonsense he sees his fellow man endure.

         
Initially he butts heads with the ward's resident intellectual, Harding (Redfield), a man who during group therapy finds himself unable to discuss his impotence. In his efforts to put things right, McMurphy, who favors friendly wagers, bets he can drive Big Nurse to distraction within a week. He also bets he can heft a water fountain in the tub room clear from the floor, chuck it through a barred window, and go downtown to wet his whistle in any bar he likes whenever he wants.

         
In the book it's not a water fountain, but a control panel.

         
Differences aside, the film is every bit as good. Alternately hilarious and sublime, packed with powerful performances and indelible images, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is as potent now as the day it was released.

ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST

Starring Jack Nicholson,

Louise Fletcher,

Will Sampson,

Danny DeVito,

Christopher Lloyd,

William Redfield,

Sydney Lassick,

Brad Dourif

Directed by Milos Forman

Written by Lawrence Hauben, Bo Goldman

Based on the novel by Ken Kesey

Runtime 133 minutes

Rated R

Stewart Kirby writes for

THE INDEPENDENT

and

TWO RIVERS TRIBUNE